Posługa charytatywna w świadomości wiernych i duszpasterzy

Abstract

In the article research results are presented, which indicate that the awareness of the priests and the lay faithful as far as charity is concerned, is to a considerable degree differentiated. Most respondents accept the need of rendering aid to the poor, and they perceive the Church as the subject of charity actions. However, at the same time most of them are not willing to personally engage in charity, counting on others’ initiative and involvement. A positive feature of lay Catholics in Poland is their eagerness to financially and materially support charity actions organized by Church institutions. In the priests’ and lay Catholics’ awareness general Christians ideas dominate in Poland, with a simultaneous shortage of thinking in terms of the whole Church. It must be worrying that as many as 72.7% parish priests and 89.8% lay Catholics do not consider charity as the Church’s basic function. In their opinion the Church may exist and properly develop without fulfilling the service of charity. Hence an obvious postulate follows that in formation of priests as well as lay people in Poland a greater stress should be put on the ecclesiological basis of charity.